First Catch Your Eland: A Taste of Africa by Laurens Van Der Post - 1977

London: The Hogarth Press Ltd,. Very Good/Very Good. 1977. First Edition. Hard Cover. 8vo 0701204133 Dust jacket complete, unclipped, some fading to spine colour. Original cloth boards with bright gilt titling on spine. Review cutting by Angus Wilson tipped in. 211 pages clean and tight. There can be few men living who know Africa as intimately as Laurens van der Post; certainly none has ever challenged his claim to have `covered more thousands of miles of Africa on my own flat feet than any other man'. It is fitting that he should have written the first comprehensive book about African cookery. And perhaps only van der Post could make of a book that deals with the entire range of African food, from the barbecued antelope of the primitive Bushman to the sophisticated pastries developed by the Cape Colonists, something that encompasses the whole history of the continent and its present predicaments in a fascinating blend of personal reminiscence, adventure and historical insight. Incidentally the recipes, many of which can be used outside Africa, are so fresh and so unexpectedly various that they must tempt the most jaded palate. First Catch Your Eland is that rare phenomenon, a book that commands a permanent place not only on the bookshelf but also in the kitchen. .